Consciousness: Pran Pratishtha To Enlightenment

Notion of Pran Pratishtha, enlivening an idol symbolically, is based on the concept of how soul suffuses our body-mind-intellect system with consciousness. No soul and body-mind-intellect is dead. Consciousness itself can take myriad forms. It would be worthwhile to understand these, to fully comprehend its ultimate state - that of enlightenment.

Primary, of course, is wakefulness where we are aware of our surroundings and act in response to various stimuli. Sleep is another state. It basically is reversible and a reduced consciousness phase and an essential part of our daily circadian rhythm - a must for our physical and mental well-being. It is in sleep that we recoup, and all bodily activities settle to their resting states to reach their potential again, next day. To delve a little deeper, sleep has various stages. Non Rapid Eye Movement, NREM, stage where heart and muscles relax, blood pressure and temperature fall - deep sleep stage. This is followed by Rapid Eye Movement, REM, stage where one dreams.

Unconsciousness is a deeper state where we are unaware of our surroundings and neither can respond to any stimuli, may be transient as a fainting attack or may last a little longer. Coma is a profound and prolonged state of unconsciousness because of altered brain activity following injury or some health condition. Anaesthesia can be called medically induced unconsciousness that is controlled and reversible as desired. So essentially, difference between sleep and unconsciousness, coma and anaesthesia would be response to stimuli; in sleep you can and in remaining three you cannot.

Then there is meditation, where you are aware of your surroundings and reality but deliberately choose not to respond and are solely focused on breathing, a fixed thought or maybe even just nothing. As you go deeper and into trance like state, you may even choose to ignore stimuli and not register them, but you never lose awareness.

So, in a meditative state you are aware, whereas in sleep you lack awareness.

Yet another state is that of hypnosis, somewhere between sleep and meditation. Awareness now is restricted to something very limited, such as commands, combined with a deep state of relaxation, features partly of meditation and sleep. A hypnotic state may be induced by someone or maybe through self-hypnosis. In hypnosis, you can tap into your subconscious eliciting your past, which is past life regression, tracing causes of your fears and phobias, understanding troubled behaviour patterns. In a narco test too, a person is taken to this state, where he loses his conscious inhibitions and truth can be elicited on asking pointed questions.

There is also altered state of consciousness, maybe because of drugs or Near-Death Experience, NDE. Here one goes into realm of heightened awareness and perception, enhanced creativity or some vague and unexplained state of ecstasy.

Now consider such a state where consciousness understands and realises soul itself, which in first place rendered it active. An awareness of all that is manifest and beyond. Realisation of all that is and can be known. This then is state of enlightenment. Post enlightenment, person continues his sojourn in this world till moksha, nirvana, and end of birth and death cycle.

Authored by: Vivek Jain